Light as a Feather
by purplecatgirl
Summary: Arthur is only the seventh child to escape from The School in history. And unlike the first six, he is alone... isn't he? Maximum Ride AU
1. Prologue

**A/N: Here's the deal: I usually write happy and sparkly stuff, but I thought i would try writing in a new style, hence this. Basically, it is a Hetalia story in a Maximum Ride universe. Which means wings, and (sadly) no country status.  
Disclaimer: I own neither Hetalia nor the Maximum Ride Verse. **

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******For Non Maximum Ride fans: This universe is just like the human world, but there is a place called "The School" in which scientists experiment on small children and combine their DNA with that of animals. Hence the wings. Then there are the escapees from the school, which are tracked down by monsters made by The School. There are not many escapees. There is also a similar company named ITEX, which has Schools ALL OVER THE WORLD. (Germany, France, England, etc.)**

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**_Prologue:_

_His wings flapped faster and faster, the beating of them got more and more unsteady, and he concentrated on staying up in the air. Blood ran down the feathers where his wings connected to his back. The things chasing him had almost caught up, and he didn't think that he could stay in the air much longer. If only there were somewhere to land… There!_

_A small clearing in what looked like an endless forest. He started descent, not noticing the house that occupied the clearing until he landed on it. He heard heavy flapping behind him. They were still chasing him._

_He dropped heavily off of the roof, landing squarely on the Welcome mat outside the front door. Finding the door open, he ran in and hid behind a dusty sofa. He heard his pursuers land in the woods and call to each other in short grunts. He waited, barely daring to take a breath in case their sharpened hearing might catch it._

_Finally, after what seemed to be hours, he heard the sound of heavy, labored flapping as they flew away. He slowly rose out from behind the sofa, wincing whenever his wings bumped into something, but too tired to tuck them into his sweatshirt; too tired to care about the dust and large mess that covered everything, as he usually would. He found his way to a bedroom and the last thing he could remember before he fell asleep on the bed was a sharp pain at the base of his wings._


	2. Chapter 1

**A/N: I have been really nervous about whether this chapter will be as good as the Prologue, I rewrote this because it went abruptly from dark to happy, and so I hope that the people who were expecting a dystopia aren't completely murderous...I also hope that all the readers will not desert me as soon as they read that Alfred will be Co-Starring with Arthur in this... Please don't kill me... I have relatives in your country!

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**He woke up exactly where he had collapsed the previous day, feeling the ache in his wings get worse. The pain was almost blinding now, making everything around him blurred around the edges, as if he had a fever. He needed to find medical supplies. It seemed the only rational thing to do, after all. He propped himself up stiffly on his arms and surveyed the room.

It was a rather large room, and extremely messy. It had two twin beds, he had fallen on the nearest to the doorway. Both of the beds looked like they had been decorated for a little girl: with purple blankets and light pink sheets. One of the beds had a canopy, and when the boy pulled it back to examine it, he found the bed to be a sort of nest, with stuffed animals, blankets, and ...feathers? That meant...

The Flock? It couldn't be... he had never dreamed of meeting...

Just then pain shot through his wings, reminding him that there were more urgent matters at hand.

He wobbled out of the room and down a long hallway, and came upon what seemed to be a kitchen, complete with a mini-island and refrigerator. He was hobbling as fast as he could to the fridge, when a voice called out:

"Hey!"

He froze in shock. There was someone else in the house too. And being behind him, they had a full view of his wings. He flipped around, almost tumbling when another wave of pain hit him. He came to face a pair of bright blue eyes. They stared at each other for a few seconds, and then the boy spoke, trying to find his voice when he hadn't spoken to anyone in so long.

"D-Don't hurt me. I... I am not a monster, please don't take me to a zoo."

The eyes widened in disbelief for a second, and then the blue-eyed boy laughed, a happy sound which the boy found quite annoying.

"I wouldn't take you to a zoo, or back to- there, either."

The boy's eyes widened, not unlike the others had done a moment ago.

"You- the School- A-are you part of- the Flock?"

"I wish" the boy said with some kind of sarcastic-bitterness.

"I do have these, though" he took a small step back and then, with some kind of show-off-y air, unfurled huge wings, dappled like a hawks. He looked like he belonged on a postcard or something. The boy leaned back in shock. Another recombinant DNA experiment? Here?

Seeing the boy's speechlessness, the other boy folded his hawk-like wings in a bit and took a step forward.

"Hey, buddy, are you alright? You seem a little- Oh my god! Blood!" was all he said when he saw my wings.

"C'mere, I've got some medical supplies right in my backpack. Sit down."

The boy sat down in relief and watched as the other winged boy procured a first aid kit and almost attacked his wings with said medical supplies.

The boy felt cool hands searching his wings for broken bones, then a wave of pain (that made three) and, a little embarrassedly, he sank into unconsciousness.

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"Uggh…" The boy awoke with some kind of a groan and sat up slowly to find the Blue-Eyed Boy sitting next to him on a dusty couch.

"Oh hey! You're awake!" he held out a hand "Alfred F. Jones."

"Whaa?" The boy responded, not quite awake yet.

"My name. Alfred F. Jones. What's yours?"

"Oh. Umm… I'm K34926cnn."

Jones shuddered. "Not your Experiment number! Your real name."

"I… don't have one."

"You haven't named yourself yet? How can you live without a name? We'll just have to name you ourselves then. Any suggestions?"

The boy looked a little shocked at how fast the conversation was progressing, and that he would now have to name himself. The other boy continued on seemingly oblivious to the other's feelings.

"Well, let's see… You have a British accent! That's adorable, so we better name you something British sounding… Hey, what do you know about the UK?"

The boy, still slightly blushing from the "adorable" comment, considered the question.

"Outside of their School? Well, only really what I read in this book once… it was The Legend of King… Arthur! King Arthur! He sounded like a really brave and noble person-"

"Arthur! That's your name until we can find one you like, although personally," he studied the boy's face, as if he was trying to find some sort of thing that made him worthy of being called Arthur.

"I think you should keep the name as it is"

The boy, now dubbed Arthur, Considered the name:

"I like Arthur." He looked back at Alfred, waiting for some kind of response, but saw that his attention was still stuck on his face.

"Earth to-"

"Those are some mighty big eyebrows, Arthur."

"You-" Arthur threatened. Standing up to punch Alfred in the face, only to find that when Alfred stood up as well, he felt… well, _Very Short. _Alfred, seeing the murderous look on his face, laughed his ridiculously happy-and-annoying laugh and leaned towards him, checking the bandages on Arthur's wings.

Arthur, noticing the bandages for the first time, craned his neck back to look at the base of his wings. He was met with the sight of clean white bandages.

"Umm… This is the first time I've ever really said this, but Thank You."

"I guess" Arthur added as an afterthought.

Alfred laughed again, a sound that Arthur decided he was going to have to get used to.

"Well, you're welcome, now let's find food; I'm _Starving_!"

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**Just... Don't desert me... *cries***


	3. Chapter 2

**A/N: THREE AND A HALF FREAKIN' MONTHS, GUYS. I'm sure some of the subscribers saw this in their inbox and went "Light as a Feather? what the hell? when did i read _that?_" three. and. one. half. sorry to anyone who subscribed. But the good news is... I'm back! with another sparkly chapter! the blood is coming, darkies, don't worry :) anyway, don't feel shy, drop a review... I would actually like to say thank you to my 5 Reviewers... **

**_lovilover13, Dark Mouse, kumori-blue, me,_ and... _Me_? are you one and the same? well, double ****acknowledgments all the same :)**

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Alfred and I had gotten up early this morning, planning to finally leave the abandoned house of the flock. He was, as per usual of the last three weeks I had known him, buzzing with excitement. I, on the other hand, was _rightfully _nervous about our upcoming departure.

"Come on Iggy, lighten up! It's not like we'll get snapped up by Erasers the moment we leave the house!"

"Alfred, you know that _could_ happen." I grumbled, mentally adding that to my list of things to worry about. He only laughed.

"Iggy! You're such a- what's the word? _Pessimist. _Think about it my way! We're going to go out into the enchanting world, possibly meeting up with The Flock on the way, and have the time of our LIVES!"

I sighed heavily. Where did he even come up with the name Iggy anyway? Wasn't that one of the members of the Flock? I'd have to try to get a word in about that later… If Alfred was going to have this attitude about everything, they were going to be killed in an instant. On the other hand, he had a point. I could be a pessimist at times. I forced the corners of my mouth upward a bit, one of my first attempts at a smile. Alfred visibly brightened when he saw my attempt.

"That's it, Iggy! You're actually smiling! Now your eyebrows don't look so scary!" my attempt at smiling decided to quit.

"BLOODY MORON!" I yelled, launching my fingers at his neck.

"aha, Iggy, let's get some work done…" he said nervously, running from the cries of "It's Arthur, you idiot! And don't make fun of the eyebrows!"

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"Alright, on three." We stood on the roof of the Flock's house, backpacks loaded and ready to head towards California, where we think the flock was last headed. Headed back to The School. The mere thought of it made me shiver, and to his credit, I hadn't seen Alfred react once to mention of the school. I knew he had the nightmares though. We both did.

"One!"

I was actually pretty worried about my injured wings. I know that thanks to the rapid rate of healing in the bird-human hybrids, three weeks in rest should have been enough. But still, who wouldn't be worried? I was hundreds of feet up in the air, soaring through clouds, not worrying about a thing that was on the ground…alright maybe I didn't have to worry.

"Two- I'll catch you if you fall! I'm the Hero after all!" Alfred announced, once again reading my mind. Really, how did the boy do it? Was that his power instead of the superman-like strength?

"Three!"

We snapped out our wings, launching ourselves off the roof. I felt myself fall for a sickening second under the weight of the backpack, but then a hand reached to hold the handle of it: Alfred's.

"Stop it! I can handle it myself! I was doing fine!" I shouted over the wind as we rose higher into the sky.

The stupid boy just flashed me another postcard-smile and let go slowly from his position a few feet above me. His huge wings put me in shadow. I swerved around and up to rest next to him. We got to a good height and settled into the familiar routine of flying. I checked my old watch: 10:45 a.m. It was 5 minutes off so… 10:40. We had almost the whole day to fly, but would have to stop for a rather large lunch, and, depending on how my wings held up, a short break. I sighed, the noise getting blown away the wind. I was so lucky to be flying again. I glanced at Alfred. He had stretched his arms in front of him in a V shape and was grinning at me. I frowned slightly back. I just had this feeling… like we were going to get a lot more than we bargained for.

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**A/N: Oh, and btw, I have already planned who they are going to meet along the way... I assure more Hetalia! oooh.. guys, If anyone's reading this... I need help.**

**noo... not that kind... The thing is... I'm ashamed to admit... I've never written a kiss scene before. That's right, you heard me. The Awesome Me has never... ANYWAY the kiss scene... **

**any Writer-to-Writer advice? COME ON I SEE YOU YAOI FANGIRLS OUT THERE**

**-Purple...what was my name again?**


	4. Chapter 3

**A/N: Hi! Chap. for y'all!

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"AAND… TOUCHDOWN!" Alfred yelled as he landed in the woods outside of a small McDonalds Parking lot. I sent another un-received glare his direction and landed softly beside him. This was our dinner stop, and we had to resort to McDonalds because _someone _had eaten ALL of our packed food for lunch. _All of it! _That was supposed to be enough for lunch, dinner, and maybe even a small breakfast! And now we had to spend what little money we had getting food we could have had in the first place. We just had to hope that no erasers had decided to get fast food as well.

We made our way into the restaurant, sighing as the air-conditioning hit our faces. There was almost no line, giving us just enough to scan the room for possible erasers. I didn't see any for now…

"What would you like dear?" The heavily make-upped woman behind the counter asked. Alfred stepped forward.

"Umm… let's see… 2 big macs, 3 chicken burgers, five Mcdonalds specials, and for desert 2 bags of apples and a large strawberry smoothie!"

Did I forget to mention bird-kids have big appetites?

Even so… _3 chicken burgers_? That's a bit much.

"so that'll be all?" The woman smiled sickeningly.

"Um, actually, no, I'll have 3 big macs, an order of fries, and a smoothie"

The woman blinked once or twice, then asked

"Do you have money to pay for all of this, dears?"

I grimaced. Well, we certainly weren't if we kept this up.

"Yes, ma'am, we have enough money" I rumaged around in my backpack and pulled out a few 20's.

"Oh okay then." The receptionist punched our order into the cash register.

"Your order will be ready in a sec, dears"

"Great! I call window seat, Artie!" Alfred shouted, rushing to the nearest booth, leaving me to trudge behind him.

"Great, Alfred, you get outside watch then." I growled, a combination of Alfred and hunger making me irritable. I scanned the room again. Wait. Over there. Them. Erasers.

"Al…" I whispered. "over there." I motioned with a slight flick of my head to a booth by the door, which held a couple of incredibly beautiful teens. Siblings, if I was right. The girl had shoulder-length wavy blond hair, kept out of her hair by red ribbons. Her brother also had blond hair, spiked. There model-like features and angry stares clued me in to their species.

Alfred inlined his head slightly towards them for a second, than whispered back:

"Theres a door out the kitchen I bet…"

I almost snorted. Like the McDonalds employees would just let us breeze through their kitchen. Then again, the Erasers were sitting almost in front of the only door…

"Let's go." I signaled, and we slowly stood up, walked over to the counter, and suddenly dashed behind it and into the kitchen. There were shouts from the employees, and… was that snarling? So the erasers were morphing in a public place. This was bad. We dashed around steel islands, finally spotting the exit. We burst through the screen door, panting and stumbling.

"We made it, Artie!" Alfred shouted as soon as he got his breath back. I smiled for once, nodding back and said

"I think we-"

I was cut short by a flash of red fabric and a claw pressing into my neck.

"Got you, mutants!" a raspy voice growled behind me.

Crap.

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A/N: wpuld you listen if i told you to review? didn't think so.**


	5. Chapter 4

**A/N: The cliffhanger will be resolved! Will Al and Iggy fly away uninjured? read on noble readers! I bring you... Light as a Feather Chapter 4! there is a lots more hetalia characters in this one! Will anyone kill me now that i added a little GerIta, and AusHun? If you don't like them, they're not as noticeable as the US/UK. Thanks everyone for reading, subscribing, and faving! LET'S GOOO!

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**Suddenly, they were standing in front of us. We had no time to open our wings. Their faces were morphed horribly into wolf-shaped features, and their mouths were open to reveal bared teeth. They didn't look so handsome anymore.

"So I see the little birdies were already heading for California. Don't worry, you'll still get there." The male eraser snarled menacingly.

"We'll just speed up the trip." The female growled.

I stepped forward bravely.

"Did anyone ever tell your script writers they've been watching to much Harry Potter? 'Cause I think they need to know. Next time, show up with some less cliché lines."

I bantered on, giving Alfred behind me time to sneak past them and kick them in the backs. They roared with uncontrolled anger, turning around to face him so that I could snap my wings out. I grabbed our backpacks and rose into the air while Alfred threw punches. Wow… He really was a good fighter… Don't get distracted!

"Hey Brutes!" I called, improvising.

"Look up!"

They instinctly did, and then got a face full of Alfred's wings. He beat them hard, rising quickly up to my level. We soared away over the McDonalds as quickly as we could, leaving the Eraser pair cursing at each other and shading their eyes with a huge paw as they glared up at us. We just flapped harder.

"…HUNGRY!" Alfred yell-whined over the wind.

"Alfred shut up!" I yelled back.

"But ARTIE! I'm HUNGRY!" Alfred yelled back.

"If I give you my fruit bar will you SHUT UP!"

"Maybe."

"Let's land. I see a National Park up ahead." We descended for the second time that day, and found some trees to sleep in. I chose a high, broad branch on an old looking tree, enjoying the rest. I heard a rustling sound and jumped. I looked above me.

"You idiot! This is MY tree!"

Whoever said that we had to have different trees?" Alfred replied innocently from the branch above me.

"It's… Disconcerting."

"Is it?" Alfred leaned down."

"Go AWAY Jones. I'm tired." I sniffed and turned my head away to hide my blush. Damned idiot.

"Fine, Iggy" There it was again. Iggy. I WOULD have to ask him about that in the morning.

"'Night, idiot." I muttered.

"'Night Iggy!"

"…Artie?"

"What is it now, Alfred?"

"Do you think we have powers like the Flock?"

"Well, don't you already have one?" I mumbled, thinking about the immense strength he seemed to possess.

"Noo…"

"You're… really strong."

There was silence for a moment.

"You mean like Superman? That'd be Freakin' AWESOME!" He shouted

"Shut UP Alfred!" I hissed.

"Kay. 'Night Arthur." He said, immediately became quiet again.

I realized that that right then was the first time he had used my given name since the moment he came up with it.

"So, I've been meaning to ask you" I said sleepily the next morning.

"Uh huh?" Alfred questioned, practically bouncing in circles around my tired self. Why the hell were some people morning people?

"Why do you call me Iggy?"

"Hmm… well, I was going to name you Ignatius!"

"WHAT?" I screamed

"Well, I was only going to name you Ignatius so that I could call you Iggy." He admitted.

"So why do you call me this again?"

"I call you Iggy whenever you're being extremely cute!"

I turned red.

"What? Don't call me cute!" I fumed.

"Alright, lets go find coffee, Iggy!"

I stomped off to get our backpacks.

"I don't even like coffee anyway."

We decided to hike and try to find a clearing in the forest so taking off would be easier. We were halfway through the forest, when we heard noises.

"Ludwig Ve~"

Feliciano, Don't wander to far ahead!"

"Roddy dear, Isn't this lovely!"

"Yes, Elizaveta."

We dashed to hide behind the trees, just on time to see four people walk into the clearing.

They had wings too.

Well, three of them had their wings out. But three was enough to make my jaw drop.

There were more mutants out there. There were a lot more.

Just then a twig snapped.

I looked over at Al to find his foot raised sheepishly. I rolled my eyes.

"What was that?" the stern voice said

I unfurled my wings and stepped out of the trees, Alfred following me.

Their jaws dropped too.

We just stared at each other for what seemed like minutes.

The nest thing I knew, I was getting the air squeezed out of me by two extremely strong mutants.

"Ooof! Gerrof!"

They let go slowly, leaving me gasping. We sat down in a circle on the forest floor, and one of them spoke up.

"Introductions ve!"

The only girl introduced herself

"Hey boys! I'm Elizaveta and this is my boyfriend Roderick! We're both 17-ish, and we've been raising these two for a while!" I studied the two of them, noticing Roderichs glasses and the slightly wilted flower in Elizaveta's hair.

"I'm Feliciano, and this is Ludwig Vee! We are staying with Lizzie and Roddy, and it's so fun, ve! And it's also great to be with Ludwig all of the time, He's German, and nice, and strong, and ties shoelaces REALLY well! And-"

"Alright Feli, I think we should let the other talk." The German said, keeping a straight face through the Italian's rambling.

"Uh, I'm Arthur, and this is Alfred, we don't really have an age yet, and we're looking for The Flock"

Silence took over for a moment, and then Elizaveta said cheerfully

"Let's go cook dinner! Feli, Alfred, you want to help me?" she unknowingly picked the clumsiest, most impossibly happy bird-kids on the earth.

"How about Hamburgers?" Elizaveta suggested.

"HAMBURGERS! I LOVE HAMBURGERS!" Alfred shouted at what seemed to be the top of his lungs. He received several exasperated shushes.

"Veeee, I wanted Pasta…" Feli said sadly.

"Feli, we had Pasta last night." Roderich said patiently.

The Hungarian pulled out a frying pan from seemingly nowhere, causing me to wonder just where she kept it. Ludwig asking me a question interrupted my strange thoughts.

"What powers do you two have?" he said in a polite way.

"…Well, I don't really know yet. I think Alfred might have super strength, but I'm not sure." I replied.

I suddenly realized that I hadn't seen Feli with his wings out.

"Does Feli not like to show his wings?" I asked Ludwig

His face darkened.

"Feli is one of the reasons why they call us mutants. He was one of the mess-ups."

I shuddered.

"What…?"

"He was born with only stubs of bone on his back. The scientists tried to figure out what went wrong, but they only made him hurt more. They deserve to die."

"I'm…sorry. How does he travel with you then?"

Ludwig's expression lightened a little.

"As I mentioned before. I have incredible strength. I carry him." His cheeks turned a little pink at the statement. He went on.

"But since Feli had no wings, he was born with a great power.-"

"Ludwig! _Ule ja aita mind õhtusöögile!_" The Italian's voice rang out in… Estonian?

"A language I can understand, Feli!" Ludwig shouted back.

"He can speak any language without having to learn it. It's extremely useful in tactical situations. Plus, I can speak German with him." Ludwig got up, leaving me sitting. I felt a little left out. All of these people had super great powers, and I didn't even know what mine was yet. It irked me.

I walked over to the fire that the others were cooking over.  
"Would you like some Fruit Bars to eat with dinner?" I offered lamely.

"Sure Arthur, put them over there." Elizabeta flashed me a warm smile and I felt a little better.

We were in good hands, for now.

**A/N: Longest chapter yet! thanks again, everyone! (I actually forgot to warn everyone that I type short chappies by instinct.)**


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